Judd

I have Techstream for my Toyota Prado, that is very involved right down to programming keys injectors airbags, full diagnostics, you name it, getting it put on the laptop was way above my poor tech knowledge and my IT chap had to sort that out but ince installed it's great to have. Whether there's an equivalent of that for Subaru i haven't a clue.

This type of thing is common in modern vehicles of all types. I drive an MAN truck, every now and again you switch on the ignition only to find a list of control module failures coming up on the screen each one of up to 7 you have to OK to delete it from the screen, then switch off wait about 30 seconds retry and all is good again. Its 3 years old at Christmas, has covered 397000kms and hasn't missed a beat so far, save the failure of one outside temp sensor**. Other vehicles give false warnings of failed bulbs on trailers etc when there's nothing wrong. I think you just have to accept that these systems are now so complex, linked and all encompassing and they will throw spurious errors periodically. On some trucks simply turning the battery isolator off for a few minutes will clear these issues, obviously that means disconnecting the battery on a car, have you tried that. ** believe it or not the failure of the outside temp sensor saw the vehicle stop using adblue completely but with no dash warnings, presumably because the system was under the impression it was 50'C outside and adjusted adblue accordingly so all ok as far as the vehicle was concerned, just shows how things are all interconnected, so maybe have a check on your car that something seemingly nothing to do with your faults isn't maybe giving an intermittent false reading or fault.

As Jay describes, its a doddle once the shaft is off, release the split pin holding the CV joint on and everything can come out be cleaned repacked rebooted refitted, easier and cleaner than most designs because (assuming its the roll pin design on the 2.5) you don't have the struggle of forcing the drive shaft out of the gearbox past it's spring circlip resistance. Quite honestly once you have the shaft off it would only be half an hour longer to sort the present problem, and you've saved the cost of a rebuilt shaft.

Our 2003 Outback was the 3.0 litre, and assuming the shafts are the same as the 2.5 they are a doddle to remove and dismantle to reboot and repack with grease. The usual problem is the inner boots sit right over the cats so due to heat perish and split, but unless they've been left for months and dried fully out allowing wear it should be possible to simply repack and reboot them good as new again, they are very well engineered parts. If they are showing wear by rattling on tight lock then simply unclipping boots and repacking with grease may well see them last the car out, i've done this many times and now do this as a matter of course during an intensive service...note the original clips on Subarus take some removing, they are tight and surprisingly strong. Shafts don't need to come out of the final drive, the inner joint is simply push fit onto the output shaft spline and held in place with a roll pin, drive that out with a drift undo the hub nut, drop the bottom ball joint and if i recall the track rod end and the shaft will come straight out, CV joints circlipped to the shaft itself, couple of hours will see them both off and rebuilt. assuming the hub isn't too tight with muck/corrosion to the shaft, but even if this were the case you could in theory remove the hub carrier with shaft in place, awkward but better than destroying the wheel bearings at the same time. Don't know if this helps but it might save you ditching perfectly serviceable shafts for the sake of an extra hlaf hour stripping cleaning and repacking your own OE set.

Most welcome mate.

One other thing. If you buy a car with top rate VED, make sure its cheap as chips because it will be almost impossible to sell on as it ages and the VED becomes an ever higher proportion of its value, when you have to pay out the lions share of a normal weeks wages just to tax the thing for a year to say it annoys is an understatment. If you want a 2.5T after regd after March 2006, best find an import, as a bonus if its a recent import it won't have been ssubject to umpteen UK salty winters so you have a rust free example to start with.

My suggestion. Cheapest car in the best overall condition you can find that suits you, try and stay out of the highest VED band, though anything could happen with taxes as the present govt seeks to claw back some of the £billions its (so far) wasted over the current flu scam, and we haven't even got started yet on the climate change £cam. Fuel is a big consideration with any petrol turbo Subaru, if you've got power and use it, they only place that power comes from is the fuel tank, and petrol prices and the taxes on it are rising rapidly and i think will do continually from now on as they try to force people to transfer onto battery cars. Diesel at motorway service areas is currently working out around £7.12 per imperial gallon with petrol only about 15/20p lower, remember its easy to get thse trubo Subarus below 20 to the gallon if you use them hard, even driven gently you'll be doing well to see 30 from one. Serously, no one can really advise you because its such a personal choice what we want balanced against the practicalities we know of and those yet to be thrust upon us. Converted cars you don't get your money back unless you happen upon a buyer who wants the same as you, unlikely, so all mods are moeny you will never see back. Take a tip from an old hand, before you spend that money whichever way you choose, withdraw it in cash form to pay for the car, when those £thousands are in your hand the reality of the graft you've done to take that money home after the taxman and everyone else has filched so much of if hits home, do not do bank transfer or pay by card, it's just figures and decimal points. You probably didn't want this reply, but when you've been around as long as me an dmade as many mistakes as we all do, you sometimes want to pass a little of that hard won experience on. Good luck with whatever you decide. Personally, in your shoes i'd find a Suzuki Swift Sport.

Quick engine oil change then had the back end up in the air for its annual rusproofing top up, these days i spray the usual suspect areas with ACF50. Just got to swap the wheels over to the winter set, probably late November, and its all ready for winter duties.

Or, get them removed and programmed out of the ECU.

I agree with you, but what's happening now is not just strange its utter lunacy. I'm not selling or buying any cars, and maintaining the current ones impeccably including continual rustproofing, don't want to be involved in any of the lunacy thats going on currently because, like you, something is going to go pear shaped soon and wouldn't want to be without my !Removed! on a chair when the music stops. It must be cheap finance at the back of the current fiasco, if the average person actually had to withdraw £34k they had earned through hard graft from their bank and either hand or sign it over they would not be so quick to spend such sums i'm sure of it. Are we heading for hyper inflation one wonders given how the price of your Lexus has escalated.

There are better products out there. I do my own rustproofing, have used Bilt Hambers products which are probably the best DIY cavity probes and products you can find, you'll need about 4/6 cans of cavity wax to fully treat inside doors wings sills bonnet boot around the wheelarches from inside the body and inside any hollow suspension or subframe sections. For outside of subframes and suspension parts, plus exposed sections of underbody which suffer heavy weather, first of clean off all existing rust and use rust converter, then zinc paint then followed by a heavy chassis paint, then when all dry and hard go over the whole underside with something like ACF50 or chain lube which will soak into all the seams...if you do it right first time all it will need is a good washdown after the winter salt has gone and a quick 20 minute recoat with whatever rust treatment you decided on during the summer..this is my regime and it works. You could instead get it treated at Krown Wolverhampton, who will coat it for you with their own product.

I wouldn't waste the money paying someone to rebuild the current engine, like you i'm no longer up to DIYing something this extensive, would either try to find a good engine from a crashed example and fit that or sell the lot as is, worth the money to fit another engine from the description of the vehicle. Damned shame, was it overdue for change. Personally i'm not a great fan of the convoluted route domestic engined Subaru cambelts take, talk about a hard life, compare with my other vehicle a 3 litre 4 pot Prado, the cambelt of which drives only the camshaft (second cam geared off the first), so one single idler/tensioner is the only thing that it turns otherwise, replacing belt is a one hour job easy DIY.

If noise is going to be an issue, and it migh be because i'm up and away by 3.30 most mornings, then i'll start the the car and drive to the end of our road where its open and let the car warm up to fully clear the screens etc. To be fair i also warm my truck engine up and let it warm down before and after working it hard (though not when parked beside sleeping drivers or houses), same as you probably do, but i think our young friend is maybe taking things to the extreme when some gently driving would warm the car up quicker, its possible he has a turbo timer fitted so the car will shut down on its own after several minutes ticking over which might account for the regulation 5 minutes tickover before shutdown, in practice unless you've been hammering the hell out of it or its blazing hot outside 2 minutes tickover is ample to cool the turbo adequately. I hope it doesn't come to this but he might find someone else living nearby won't be qute as polite about this issue by pass the quiet word and vent their spleen on the car. I just wish some motorcyclists and V8 engine owners who've had straight thru exhaust fitted were as considerate as most (i hope) Subaru owners.

Long way from you but consider a day out in Walsall https://www.mijexhaust.com/ and get a custom made stainless system fitted, not as expensive as you might imagine, had two systems from them and will use them again whenever. If you do a search on here (probably the Forester forum) you'll find some pics on here of the system they made up for me, cat back under £300 all incl each system, last vist was last years so prices might have gone up, they'll quote you over the phone. I asked for a reasonably quiet system on the XT, OE system was 2.5", they recommended a 2.25" stainless because quieter but no worse restriction due to less restrictive silencers, the OE steel system sounded bleh (not unequal headers on the Foz) but the system MIJ put on sounds really nice, proper Scooby sound now without that annoying racket at motorway cruising speeds one often finds with some sporty type systems.

I drove car transporters for years, too many hence why me joints are about knackered. Generally found VW/Audi the most up their own fundament, Mitsi the most miserable dealers by far (exceptions like Holbeach who were great), Toyota the most friendly and helpful dealers by a country mile, QC at both the Burnaston factory and Portbury import centre is seriously impressive. I liked Mitsis generally but only bought one, a Mk1 Outlander, not a joyous car to own though it benefitted from importers LPG conversion (no flashlube bad oversight so they suffered valve seat recession) which thankfully made the frankly ridiculous rate it drank fuel for precious little performance a little less painful. See you're in Gloucestershire, is the Subaru importer still on the outskirts at Quedgeley would you know, been many years since i went there.

Quite obvious the car has stood for long enough (before you bought it) for the battery to have become damaged due to being left discharged, you'd think that unless this particular car stood in a remote (ie commercial storage) compound that a decent garage would have a system in place for keeping batteries charged in sequence, or as some commercial compounds do, at the very least disconnect the thing so it keeps its existing charge for a long time. Most disappointing, if that car had needed jump starting more than its initial start up when brought out of storage the battery should have been replaced immediately, as it is they've upset a customer who's rightly voiced his concern on a make specific forum...if this is typical of the marque's dealers they could well be going the way of Mitsubishi's dealers and head office staff in the near future.

If i may say so you have excellent taste, a lovely wholesome looking lady and an equally rare car, chapeau. Congratulations on such a long marriage. As for servicing, i used to fit an in between oil change into my Hilux when it was still under warranty, but can't say as i've come across such an odd thing as the difference between your oil change and service intervals, suggest you submit the car at 10k and just let them bring the normal service intervals forward 2k, you could always do as i did and slip an oil change in yourself at half way point, you might find the genuine oil bought over the counter to do this isn't that expensive, circa £15 for 5 litres at Toyota in 2008, but they'd charge something like £80 for 7.5 litres of the same oil at service time! Might be interesting to get some quotes for servicing from the various dealers and make your plans, there can be large cost differences, some rural dealers of other makes can be much cheaper for servicing but i have no idea if this applies to Subaru, if this is the case it might be worth getting it done in another part of the country and make it part of a trip, business or pleasure.

Fantastic bargain. Do you have a good Subaru dealer to keep it serviced for you, at least during the warranty period?

Welcome and nice car choice there, excellent colur which won't age like some (very similar to our Forester), bargain too, well played. Mate of mine really wanted the used Levorg he test drove at the local dealership couple of years ago, which wouldn't budge one inch on the well overprice, he instead found a bargain priced A4 Diesel estate...my suggestion the Subaru because he really wanted something a bit different. Hope you get an enjoyable ownership experience.

One of my litmus tests of a mechanic or service centre is what their attitude is to brake servicing. Peer at them through the wheels (in the hope of finding lucrative need for material renewals) and spray brake cleaner in the general direction? Or do they remove the wheels, then the pads and thoroughly clean and check things then if all good lubricate things properly especially any sliding mechanisms, which is proper brake servicing. The former often leads to seized sliders leading to imbalanced braking excessive heat on the working parts, or excessive heat on parts that don't retract, ultimately premature wear and replacement of parts, calipers/discs, that would have serviceable for many years as well as keeping thos ebrakes in top working order all through their life. If they can't be bothered to service the brakes, arguably the most important part of a car, then what else can't they be bothered with. Other than that, yes if you've found a good set of mechanics by all means let them service the vehicle, only downside is they might not have the necessary software to interrogate or reprogram things if more intensive jobs need doing, and if applicable here if a cambelt change was due has anyone there taken part in a Subaru cambelt change, not exactly the simplest of belts to change.

Tim Farmer (Subbus) is a mobile Scooby mechanic based in Lincs, he's done work for me incl aux pump delete but that was on a 2.5T Forester, whether he can do the same for you i know not. He's noted for good work around the various Subaru forums, reluctant to post his tel number openly and unsure if there's a PM option here or if i've earned the rights to it yet but if you have a poke nose around the Subaru forums you'll probably alight on him. There's also Zen Performance at St Ives Cambs, not mobile.

If you put these search words into Ebay you'll find several suitable complete units for sale, course i can't guarantee the joints arn't seizing, some Chinese knock off brand new kits for around £40. ''headlight level sensor link''

I suggested a Levorg to a friend of mine when he was looking for a decent estate car different to the endless German clones, he test drove the only one we could find in the county and was quite smitten with it but the Subaru dealer would not budge on the (in my humble) inflated price, he ended up with a really quite nice A4 Diesel estate instead, so didn't get something unusual after all and i'm a little concerned his typical running won't keep the DPF happy, but so far so good.

2.7 twin turbo, Diesel PSA engine which also found its way into Jaguars if my memory serves?, linked to a standard RWD vehicle of much more modern design with a very slippery shape, Diesels are much more efficient than petrol engines, hence why almost all vans and trucks are Diesel powered. Somehow i doubt that V6 will be running as well as your Scooby when its 21 years old. It might be worth servicing your brakes properly, ie all pads out exercise the pistons in their bores, remove the stainless anti rattle clips that sit at the top and bottom of the caliper, wire brish the calipers and those clips before refitting, re-assemble using the correct brake grease on the sliding pins. Japanese cars all suffer with salt corrosion issues of the brakes, it might be yours are dragging a little more than they need or you could have a seizing piston or slider causing excessive brake drag. Good brake servicing is something we should all do at least every other year, preferably annually in the spring, few garages service brakes correctly, peering at them and squirting brake cleaner in their general direction is not servicing the brakes.

You're doing mid twenties mpg, depending on the type of driving you do that's about right, you might get early to mid thirties if you drove open roads at steady constant speeds, but for general running about mid twenties is par, this is the downside of full time 4WD. Those with turbocharged Scoobies have seen figures of 15/17mphg when driven hard or in stop start traffic.